Two Israeli Cabinet Ministers said Thursday that they hoped US President Donald Trump was about to move his country's embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, as a decision deadline neared.
The issue is deeply controversial.Shifting the building could be seen as a de facto recognition of Israel's claim over the whole city, including predominantly Palestinian east Jerusalem.Foreign countries, including the United States, currently have their embassies in the Israeli commercial capital Tel Aviv since they do not recognise Israel's unilateral claim of control over all of Jerusalem.
"I hope that an absurd situation will end," Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing likud party told public radio.
He argued that when US presidents came to Israel, they went to Jerusalem and not Tel Aviv.Environment Minister Zeev Elkin, who also holds the Jerusalem affairs portfolio, told army radio that there was "no logical reason for this transfer to be postponed again."